📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Orange Klondike (Klondajk Oranzhevyj)
- 🌍 Origin: A reliable commercial Russian variety, often distributed by major seed companies like Aelita.
- 🌿 Plant Habit: A true determinate (bush) variety. It stays extremely compact, maxing out around 24-28 inches (60-70 cm) tall. It is an absolute low-maintenance dream because it requires zero pruning or suckering!
- 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Beautiful, saturated bright orange fruits with a slightly flattened (oblate) and ribbed shape. They average around 5.3-7 oz (150-200 g) early on, becoming slightly smaller late in the season.
- 👅 Flavor & Use: Very dense, meaty, and nearly seedless with a sweet flavor profile. They hold up incredibly well on the counter and won’t crack in the rain. An amazing workhorse for outdoor gardens, but as one grower hilariously noted—watch out, because squirrels absolutely love this specific tomato!
Orange Klondike (determinate). The bush grew to about 24-28 inches (60-70 cm), and I didn’t prune it at all. It produces bright, deeply saturated orange fruits that are oblate and slightly ribbed.
It’s an early variety. This year it didn’t quite reach its full sweetness, but in past years it was much sweeter. Great in salads. Firm, meaty, and has almost no seeds. It’s a long-season producer and keeps pumping out fruit right up to the very end of the season. You actually want to plant it in light shade cast by other tomatoes, not in the absolute sunniest spot.
It holds well on the bush without turning to mush and has a great shelf life indoors. It didn’t drop any blossoms and is extremely resistant to cold, heat, and crazy temperature swings. The skin is firm but peels right off. It didn’t crack in the rain at all. This is the only tomato variety in my garden that the squirrels actually go after, so you have to keep a close eye out and protect it from them.
Average fruit weight is around 5.3-7 oz (150-200 g), though by the end of the season they downsize to 4.2 oz (120 g) or less. Very disease resistant overall.
Thanks for the heads up about the squirrels! Our dog doesn’t let them anywhere near the yard. But the chickens and chicks are a whole different story. We have to explain to our dog’s soul that they are “ours” when we let him sniff the newly hatched chicks. The chickens are allowed to flutter over into the garden sometimes. So I’m sure there will be plenty of other “fans” of this wonderful variety besides us!
Is anyone else growing this variety?
A cashier I know at the store recommended it to me today. It’s her first time planting it, and so far she really likes how it grows. She said it’s a sturdy bush, blooms heavily, and sets fruit perfectly both outdoors in the dirt and in the greenhouse. Her seeds were from the Aelita brand. I’m debating if I should grab a packet for next year while they are still in stock?
I grew it outdoors in the dirt and didn’t sucker it at all. I honestly wouldn’t call the bush “sturdy”… 😕 But the yield is fantastic, you don’t need to prune it, these beauties aren’t small, and they are bright orange. What else do you need for happiness? 😄
I grew it outdoors in the open ground this past 2020 season. Unfortunately, due to a nasty bout of Late Blight, I had to pull the fruit off the bush way ahead of schedule. A few of them did manage to ripen up indoors for me, though.
User Ornella mentions buying seeds from “Aelita”. In Russia and Eastern Europe, Aelita is one of the largest commercial seed vendors (similar to Burpee or Ferry-Morse in the US). Orange Klondike is a stabilized, commercially available variety over there, which explains its incredible reliability, disease resistance, and compact, no-prune bush habit. It is an excellent choice for a low-maintenance, high-yield container or patio garden!
